A Green Mountain Transit bus at Burlington’s Downtown Transit Center on Sept. 22, 2026. Carly Berlin / Vermont Public Carly Berlin covers housing and infrastructure for Vermont Public, in partnership with VTDigger. As Vermont bus routes are eliminated or become less frequent, a new campaig n is calling on state leaders to find a reliable funding source to keep buses rolling.  “When a route is cut, it isn’t just a line on a map that disappears,” said Linda Bowden, a transit rider and volunteer with AARP Vermont, at a press conference launching the Ride Public campaign at Burlington’s Downtown Transit Center on Tuesday.   “It’s a missed doctor’s appointment. It’s a worker struggling to get to a job. It’s an older adult unable to reach the grocery store. It’s someone sitting alone at home because they no longer have a way to get out and participate in community life,” Bowden said. Federal pandemic-era aid helped keep public transit authorities across the county running while ridership dipped. For Green Mountain Transit in northwestern Vermont, the state’s largest transit provider, that included free rides.  But that COVID money is gone now, and transit providers are on shakier ground with the feds – who still provide the majority of Green Mountain Transit’s budget, said Clayton Clark, the authority’s general manager. Transit agencies are also contending with rising healthcare costs and higher driver wages driven by workforce shortages in the industry. The state Legislature has intervened with one-time infusions of cash, but still, GMT has cut 15-20% of its service in recent years, Clark said, including the entire Jeffersonville commuter route and a host of frequency reductions for Burlington-area lines. Other transit providers have slashed services, too: Southeast Vermont Transit discontinued on-demand shuttle service last summer, and Marble Valley Regional Transit District based in Rutland cut runs on many lines earlier this year. Burlington Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak speaks at a press conference for the Ride Public campaign on Sept. 22, 2026. Carly Berlin/Vermont Public and VTDigger Clark expects Green Mountain Transit will have another $2 million shortfall next year if state officials and lawmakers don’t intervene this coming legislative session, meaning more cuts down the road.    “When you look across the country at transit organizations that have economic resiliency, they all share something in common, and that is a dedicated funding source for public transit – that is a revenue source that can be counted on, regardless of what the current political situation is,” Clark said. GMT – and the broader Ride Public campaign – are agnostic about where such funding would come from, and did not provide a dollar amount for how much is needed annually statewide.  The current funding model over-relies on property tax revenues from municipalities that pay into the transit authority, Clark said. Communities outside Vermont have looked to sales taxes to boost transit funding, he said. In the past, state leaders have considered adding an extra fee on motor vehicle registrations, or a monthly fee tacked on to residents’ utility bills to generate revenue for transit. Campaign speakers – including the mayors of Burlington and Winooski – emphasized that Vermont must figure out sustainable transportation funding to help meet the state’s climate goals, aid the growing share of older Vermonters who can no longer drive, and connect people to healthcare, schools and jobs.  The Ride Public campaign is hosted by the Transportation for Vermonters coalition, coordinated by the Vermont Natural Resources Council. The campaign is calling on Vermonters to ride the bus and talk to elected officials about the importance of reliable funding for transit. During the press event, Detroit Patterson got off his bike at the transit center and walked to the center of the small crowd to say his piece. He is homeless, he said, and as buses come less frequently and riders must pay fares again, he has a harder time getting around. “I want y’all to make sure that we have the public transportation to be able to get to where we need to get to,” he said. Read the story on VTDigger here: Advocates for public buses say Vermont needs new systems for raising funds. ...read more read less